


An Inherited Burden

by Night-Mare (Aoife)



Series: Cradle 'verse [16]
Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Flame Active Character(s), POV Aria, Side Story, Unconventional Uses for Dying Will Flames
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-20
Updated: 2017-05-21
Packaged: 2018-11-02 21:05:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10952727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aoife/pseuds/Night-Mare
Summary: Aria and some of the later events in theCradle 'verse. (Starts with the events inCandle, Candle, Burning Bright)





	1. Burning Bright

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Hand That Rocks the Cradle Rules the World](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10607250) by [Night-Mare (Aoife)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aoife/pseuds/Night-Mare). 



She's bored. Deeply, and profoundly _bored_. The meetings are mostly just posturing; especially between the men. There are very few female bosses in this room, and she's the only Active Sky; there are a few female Guardians, but even most of those are Latent.

The creeping Misty Storm Flames attract her attention, as they do Gamma's, and then excuse themselves from the conversation she's engaged in, and drift towards it's epicentre. They're not familiar, those Flames, and something tells her she should find out more.

Especially as the Flames are definitely under conscious control with the way that their user is able to pull them back in again. It means she's there, watching when it all goes wrong. And she sees the brilliance of the little Sky accompanying Dino Cavallone, and she can't help but recognise those Flames. She's dreamed about them for years.

What she hasn't dreamed about is them being _here_ , now. They should be in Japan; and Don Cavallone's Flames shouldn't be _nearly_ that calm, nor him so capable - it's a change from the established patterns. Nor is that particular Don suppose to be dead yet; everything is changing, and it's both disorientating, and - her hand drops to her belly - perhaps, hopeful.

Her pacifier glows faintly, and she steps to one side just in time to avoid being pushed away from the confrontation that's about to happen. Which only cements her opinion that something strange has been happening; no one has stood up to Don Vongola since her own mother's death, and here is one of the youngest of the current Dons doing just that.

To defend a ward. Not even his own child, but a _ward_. (And the bonded Guardian of a Sky that she had no idea how Timoteo di Vongola wasn't recognising; what had happened to his _vaunted_ intuition?) And he's successful - though perhaps it's how close he is to Raging, and the way the younger Sky leans into him and lends him his strength? But he's interesting. Perhaps even strong enough, mentally, this version of Dino Cavallone to bear the weight of the Sky Mare Ring -

(Her eyes flash orange, if anyone had been paying attention to her; and she giggles. It's the first vision she's had in _years_ that makes her laugh. Gamma raises an eyebrow at her, and she mouths "later" at him. Her right hand was a good man, and he'd appreciate knowing that their daughter was going to _thrive_.)

\- even if he was, though, Tsunayoshi would need to be wearing the Vongola Ring soon, would need it in it's unSealed form. Which was easy enough for her and the other Arcobaleno to do; she'd just need to dig Verde and Skull out of hiding.

She slipped out of the meeting in all the hubbub of Dino Cavallone's more dramatic exit, and kissed her right hand once they were in private, and then directed him to take her _home_. There were plans to remake, but the load on her shoulders felt _much_ lighter.


	2. Mare Rings

Verde admits to being banned from the Cavallone estate and she glares at him - and encourages Kaiman to torment his partner for her. The crocodile is quite happy to agree, and she stalks out of his lab to round up Skull; the little Cloud tries to evade her, but having been annoyed by Verde's admission, she exerts her Harmony on Oodako and uses the octopus against him, and removes his helmet once the octopus has brought him to her.

"If you're banned from the Cavallone estate as well, Skull de Mort, we're going to have _words_." The little stuntman squeaks, and she dials back her Harmony just a bit; she probably shouldn't take her annoyance at Verde out on him.

"I'm supposed to be _working_!" She's tempted to shake him.

"This is Arcobaleno business, Skull." He blinks at her. Her voice softens; "I saw a future where the curse is at least partially broken -"

The stuntman stops fighting her; she's said the magic words that would have gotten any of the Arcobaleno her mother's actions had cursed to cooperate. "And you need me?"

She hums, and then takes mercy on him. "There's a Sky who needs a Cloud, and he'll treat you _far_ better than your current employers, Skull de Mort." That earns her a wild eyed gaze; and oh, he's not seen Reborn, or Mammon, or Lal Mirch since they succumbed. She wonders if she should reassure him that the current generation of Skies was stronger - and kinder - that her mother's generation had been.

(She debates warning him about Tsunayoshi's little Cloud, but for some reason the little monster likes Skull, and doesn't bite him to death as far as she could see - and a Skull-Kyoya alliance would drive Fon up the wall.)

She herds the Cloud into her limousine, and directs Gamma to take them directly to the Cavallone estate; she's not going to let the Cloud escape his fate, not when it'll save her little girl and the rest of them.

She hands Skull almost directly into Kyoya's hands with a small smile when they arrive at the Cavallone estate; she _almost_ wants to be a fly on that wall. Almost. She doesn't need him for this part of her plan, and Dino will rescue him from Fon's grandson. It's next year that she - they - will need him for.

Dino Cavallone faces her in his father's study; there are four of her mother's victims arrayed with him, and that only makes her smile more. Three of them have finally found their Skies; Skies they wouldn't have lived long enough to meet without the curse. It's just as well there's nothing to stop someone wearing two of the three parts of the tri-ne-sette if they're strong enough; and she wants to see her father's face when he realises he is the Tenth Vongola Sun.

But not yet. She's here to take the second step into making the vision she's seen 'real'. She bites the inside of her lip as she pulls out the cursed box of the Mare Rings; she's _sure_ , but there are the tales of these rings driving the unworthy insane, and she's _seen_ it, too, and she doesn't want that fate for this man. But she wants her daughter to live, more.

"You've changed a lot, Dino Cavallone. I'm asking you to change one more thing." She opens the ring box she's holding, and the four Arcobaleno present, all of whom recognise them try and stop Dino reaching out and taking the Mare Ring of the Sky and sliding it onto his finger. She holds her breath; she's seen what happened when the Cervello handed this ring to Byakuran Gesso.

She laughs in relief, manic relief when he looks up from the Ring still whole, still sane, and gives thanks to her family's ancestress, and makes plans to find this world's Byakuran Gesso. "You've got no idea how happy I am, Dino Cavallone, that that Ring likes you; and I will not be telling Timoteo di Vongola precisely what he tried to do six weeks ago; I'll leave that to you. But I will be there when you need me."

She sweeps back out of the Cavallone estate, leaving the other Rings on his desk, and curls up in her limousine. Things were looking _good_.


	3. Anti-Climax

She watches the markers from her visions coming, and promises Dino Cavallone that if she brings Verde onto his territory, _she_ will keep him under control. He nearly asks her _why_ , she can tell, but she taps her pacifier and he shakes his head, ruefully. She may not be _the_ Sky of the Arcobaleno, even if she is the Arcobaleno Sky, but she still has responsibilities to them, and he assumes it's something to do with it, she suspects. But it means she can drag Verde along to what's coming; now all she needs to do is talk Colonello off the Island for a few days -

\- it still takes her almost by surprise. Events are shifting and unfolding so quickly that she barely reaches the site on time. In fact she does miss the start; but she steps into the formation facing the first Vongola generation without hesitation, and she wonders what they had changed that the first and the tenth generations - who fate seemed to decide were going to be twins of each other - were mismatched. Not that it matters; not with Daemon Spade smiling that smile, and her and Dino backing Tsuna up; not with Kyoya Hibari, even stronger than the current Cloud Arcobaleno and her father, the Sun Arcobaleno flanking him. She thinks it's possible that with the Rings unSealed, this tenth generation would outdo the first.

There's a dragging sensation on her Flames, and she almost fights it, except she's heard about the ascension ceremony of the Vongola and she can feel reality shifting around her; feel that it's being driven by the Rings, and the demands of pulling more than just the heir in.

There's the Vongola's crest on the floor, and more Skies appearing; including one she damn well knows is Timoteo di Vongola, who appears on his knees, and this is beyond the capabilities even she'd known these Rings had, and she understands better why she and Dino Cavallone and Xanxus di Vongola are here when the woman who has to be Daniela di Vongola steps forward and slaps her son so hard he bleeds.

This is a warning; and more than one person needs to see it, to be sure that future generations will remember it. The First is not that happy; not really, but Dino has done a good job teaching Tsuna about reality, and everything she knows about Giotto di Vongola tells her that the man was a hopeless idealist - like her mother, who got eight good men and women cursed and didn't think to warn them. She prefers a realist.

(She takes great delight in helping Nana and Bianchi set their World on it's rear.)

Byakuran Gesso is found, a civilian boy in Japan. She arranges for him, and his best friend, Shoichi Irie to be introduced to Tsuna, and brought under Nana's wing. It's another step in breaking the curse.

Her daughter, Yuni, and Nana's two babies will grow up together; the curse is not broken _yet_ , but it will be, and she allows herself to take the same chibi form as the rest of the Arcobaleno. She will buy her daughter as much time as she can, just in case. She trusts, but she had trusted her mother, and look where that had gotten her.


End file.
